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American Thinker: ‘Ultimate Goal’ is Reduce Number of Guns

A writer at American Thinker on Saturday put it bluntly about the gun prohibition lobby, and so far nobody has screamed that his pants are on fire.

According to author Ben Cohen:

“For the most passionate advocates of gun control, the ultimate goal was never an assault weapons ban or universal background checks. For them, the ultimate goal was a system that included very high barriers to gun ownership, along with major restrictions on the type of weapon one could own. The overarching goal of such regulations would be to reduce the number of gun owners and the number of guns in private hands.”

Cohen’s analysis came a few days after the Wall Street Journal noted that Peter Ambler, executive director of the anti-gun Americans for Responsible Solutions complained that national reciprocity, which is being seriously discussed in the wake of Donald Trump’s election “allows people that have permits from states with the weakest standards possible to carry [weapons] in the streets of any U.S. city.”

That may be a hollow bit of alarmist rhetoric, considering the finding of John Lott, president and founder of the Crime Prevention Research Center. In February 2015, Lott noted in a report that concealed carry permit holders have a low rate of convictions, even when compared to police officers who run afoul of the law.

Trump made a point of suggesting during the campaign that a carry permit or license should enjoy the same recognition as a driver’s license in all 50 states. That makes sense to a lot of people who have concluded that one does not leave the right of self-defense, or the right to keep and bear arms, at the border of his/her home state. Many states have reciprocal concealed carry agreements, and others simply honor licenses and permits as a matter of course.

But Cohen has framed the situation precisely. Anti-gunners aren’t interested in “control.” They want to discourage as many people as possible from exercising their Second Amendment rights. For those who do, they want to make gun ownership so cumbersome as to be a regulated privilege rather than a civil right.

The WSJ predicted that some Democrats and Republicans anticipate some form of national concealed carry to become law during the next session of Congress.

Anti-gunners were not expecting a Trump victory. Prior to the election, they were literally drooling at the prospect of ratcheting down on guns, and having Hillary Clinton nominate anti-gun judges and justices to the courts. They expected Democrats to control Congress.

Things didn’t work out as they expected, but that hasn’t changed their long-term goals. And that is possibly the biggest difference between gun rights activists and the gun prohibition lobby. Anti-gunners are patient, and now with literally billions of dollars backing their efforts, from people like Michael Bloomberg, they have time. That’s how erosion works, a little bit at a time until nothing remains.

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About Dave Workman

Dave Workman is an award-winning career journalist with an expertise in firearms and the outdoors. He is the author of several books dealing with firearms politics. He has a degree in editorial journalism from the University of Washington and is a lifelong Washington resident.